Towards!a!system!of!open!access to!publications

Driven by a digitization of society, the academic publishing industry has undergone major changes in the past two decades, with online articles replacing paper-printed articles as the main example. Furthermore, in November 2013 the Dutch government formulated the aim to reach a system of full open access to publications (OAP) by 2024 and in May 2016 the Competitiveness Council of the EU took important decisions to achieve immediate OAP by 2020. Clearly, a transition towards OAP has been initiated, reflected by the establishment of a remarkable number of open access (OA)-journals. Nevertheless, publishers of OA-journals face major challenges. To overcome these challenges and establish a successful introduction to the market, the innovation of OAP has to fulfil customer’s needs and be superior to alternatives. Therefore, an understanding of potential customers and the factors influencing their decision to adopt the innovation, is important. This research focuses on the scientist as the customer of OAP, because a scientist decides where to submit his/her paper and therefore whether or not to publish in OA.